FLORENCE DORE
with MEMBERS OF THE dB’s AND SON VOLT
plus support
PODGE LANE
Whelan’s Upstairs – Wed 3rd May 2023
“When you have members of Son Volt (Mark Spencer) and The DB’s (Will Rigby, Gene Holder) in your band, you can expect a blistering set. That’s precisely what we got, an all-killer and zero-filler performance that had me first in the queue at the merch desk for Florence’s new album HIGHWAYS & ROCKETSHIPS.” — Lonesome Highways
“reflective and funny and semi-biographical, while still finding room for a little acid.” —Since I Left You, Steve Earle & Florence Dore Live Show Review
“with smart lyrics and instantly appealing tunes… Florence Dore’s melodies go straight to the heart.” –The Big Takeover
“a strong album of fresh originals” –Top Pick, What’s UP New Providence
Nashville-born, Chapel Hill-based Florence Dore’s newest record, Highways and Rocketships, recorded with with Mitch Easter and Don Dixon, won Best Americana Album of the Year at Lonesome Highway Magazine. Even not counting the pandemic, the road from her first record Perfect City to Highways and Rocketships has been anything but straight. She spent a lot of time between then and now riding around on Steve Earle’s tour bus, catching up with her Dukes-drumming husband Will Rigby (also of the legendary dB’s), wrote a couple books, put on a conference at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, took a seat on the board at the Bob Dylan Institute–and had a kid. Back in 1994 the Posies covered Florence’s song “Christmas” for the Geffen release, Just Say Noel, and over the first pandemic months, when she had to suspend recording plans for Highways and Rocketships, she co-created Cover Charge, the charting compilation of NC artists to benefit Cat’s Cradle.
Dore may be rocking at night, but during the day she is a professor at UNC Chapel Hill, teaching literature and songwriting classes. She keeps up with the tenure clock writing books and articles about rock. In Ink in the Grooves, Conversations on Literature and Rock ‘n’ Roll, which includes essays by and interviews with the likes of Richard Thompson, Laura Cantrell, and Roddy Doyle. Florence has been touring hard since the record came out in June, with the dB’s rhythm section, Rigby and Gene Holder, as well as Mark Spencer (Son Volt) on guitar.
Florence is married to the esteemed dB’s drummer Will Rigby, and when the two had a baby in 2005 Will was touring heavily as drummer for Steve Earle & the Dukes. Parenting with a touring husband took Florence off the road until recently (kid is applying to college), but in the intervening years she figured out how to stay connected to music: the interviews and essays in The Ink in the Grooves attest to the years of conversation she’s been enjoying as Board member at the Bob Dylan Institute in Tulsa, conference planner at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and just sitting around on Steve’s bus. Steve Earle, Dom Flemons, and Lucinda Williams all appear in these pages, and, though she sadly missed the man himself, so do members of John Prine’s band. “How could I help but be drawn back into songwriting,” she quips, after being around so many amazing songwriters for so long?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dnlyYTY3PfA
CONNECT
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TICKETS
€21.50 available online from Whelan’s.
– 50c per ticket service charge applies.
Strictly over 18′s, I.D. may be required.
AFTER THE GIG
Whelan’s Silent Disco from 10:30pm – 2 DJs, just pick the one you like best (€5 cover charge), plus Late Bar